Note: First published in the 1828 Christmas gift annual, pp. 249-64, under the heading (third line, all caps) "By the author of Granby." Some sources may report the first publication date as November or December or Christmas 1828, or as 1829.

Synopsis: "Lister's Parodic play is an unproduced conversation piece whose participants describe their occupancy of a world almost predictive of H G Wells's The Time Machine (1895), with Eloi-like upper classes gossiping complacently about their Robot servants and the speed of motor-driven Transportation from one resort to another, while Morlock-like lower classes both labour and educate themselves, partly by reading Proto-Sf romances." (underscore represents linked cross-reference) --SFE: Encyclopedia of Fantasy (1997), biographical entry by John Clute